In <E4C18AF6-2530-11D9-A198-000A95B17A80(_at_)gmx(_dot_)de> Martin Trautmann
<traut(_at_)gmx(_dot_)de> writes:
On 2004-Oct-22, at 13:45, Charles Lindsey wrote:
A file in mbox format cannot contain a news article. If the file is in
some "mbox-like" format, then it is up to the implementor of the
format to
make provision.
Why can't it be mbox files? There's lots of postings that I archive
locally. It looks to me like a news article in mbox format. What's the
difference?
An mbox file contains '^From ' lines that contain the envelope From
address, plus a time stamp. Since news articles don't have any envelope,
they cannot be stored in pure mbox files.
I have no doubt that files in a similar style to mbox can be used to
hold news articles (the mbox format is noted for lack of any rigid
definition anywhere), but in that case I would expect the news articles
for have a '^From ' line formatted in some different way that could be
used to distinguish them from any email messages that might have got mixed
in.
On the other hand Newsgroups would qualify as a good news indicator -
while the message may have been Cc-ed and thus is in fact an email.
Exactly.
But I lost track what for we do need to know the difference: If it's
here for me, I may add one or the other processing. But I can build a
posting from an E-Mail or do the opposit as well. It would not be good
behavior because of many reasons anyway (e.g. someone might be confused
because of a reply while he can't get the originated message).
The problem arises in User Agents that try to overload one of the same two
buttons "Reply" and "Reply-to-All" to double up as the "Followup" button
when operating in News mode (a practice strongly deprecated by the GNKSA,
but prevalent in many 2nd rate agents anyway).
If there is an explicit "Followup" button, then the agent knows it is
supposed to be producing a News followup (and if you try and use it on an
email with no Newsgroups header, then it knows to complain).
But if there is just some form of "Reply" button, and it is not keeping
track of whether it is in a News folder or an Email folder, then it has to
"guess" which it is supposed to be doing. And my original point was that
just looking for the presence of a Newsgroups header was a most unreliable
discriminant, because many emails that have been gatewayed from news, or
which have been Posted-and-Mailed, can contain a perfectly legitimate
Newsgroups header (which is indeed quite informative for the recipient),
but they are still emails, and the Reply button should generate an email
reply. Of course, if there is a "Followup" button as well, then you have a
choice.
--
Charles H. Lindsey ---------At Home, doing my own thing------------------------
Tel: +44 161 436 6131 Fax: +44 161 436 6133 Web: http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~chl
Email: chl(_at_)clerew(_dot_)man(_dot_)ac(_dot_)uk Snail: 5 Clerewood Ave,
CHEADLE, SK8 3JU, U.K.
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